How Much Wood Would a Woodchuck Chuck?

How do you know if you have mumps?

Lordy... My throat could make the Macy's parade. I've seen snakes on the Nature Channel have an easier time swallowing their meals. Not good. Really, not good.
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Getting My Sugar Together

It is time to get my life back on track. Aside from taking these edits seriously, I have also been applying to a couple conferences, trying to square my over-due RA work, getting back into contact with friends (and crawling out of my hermitage), and thinking about life not as a permanent state of horror-over-the-present, but as a hope-for-the-future kind of deal. I have accepted an invitation to do a lecture next term, and am even starting to think about next summer.

I know all this is not at all interesting, but there you have it.
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With a Little Bit of Luck...

... this thing will be out of my hands on Tuesday night or Wednesday morning, and off to the publisher on Thursday, and that'll be it. Do I feel satisfaction? Not really. Relief? Not yet. Tired? Most definitely.

Harassed? You got it, baby.

Nonetheless, tonight's thought: Nat Cole is sublime, and dim blue light the coolest possible thing on jangled nerves.

Now... bed. Definitely bed.


PS: A note to my drafted readers; if you want a new draft, there's one available. Just whistle. You do know how to whistle, don't you...
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Jack Benny... End Game?

A new draft is complete, and has been sent out to various friends and proof-readers for its final skim before submission. Hopefully, it will survive the process without too much horror, and I can wrap up the poor Jack Benny piece, once and for all.

And what a long and frustrating journey it has been, too. From a random ad posted on a JB fansite, to a finished piece, to a rejection, to a contest, to another rejection, to the market to find some place to put it, now to this...

All roads lead somewhere. That may not be a profound sentiment, but it is all I can be sure of right now.

Now, it is time to get myself into even more trouble by sending off an abstract for conference consideration, and then it is my re-ward: A few more hours of Larry David, for last minute "research."

*snicker* I love my work.

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There's Music in the Clatter of the Keyboard

Good news: Am not dead of German Measles or any other such illness.

Bad news: Still not finished re-writing the conclusion of my piece.

See Holly run. See deadline approach. Run, Holly, run.
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Stop the Rocking!

So now I seem to have a fever and my stomach seems intent on jumping out my throat every time I stand up from sitting down... What does my system have against deadlines, anyway?

Oh well. I have three seasons of Curb Your Enthusiasm for use in researching the new conclusion requested by the Editor, so nothing can stop me now... Except for yellow fever or malaria, which I am not sure I don't have, my stomach ache is so bad.

Orange pop, lots of cool air, a popsicle, and sheer will power. That is all that is keeping me upright right now. Wish me luck.
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Urgh! Slept in!

Crud. I over-slept. Now, has all the "I will survive" good-will I collected up yesterday gone up in one snooze-button-induced puff of progress-dissolving plume of disaster?

Only time will tell.

Now begins the scramble.
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I WILL SURVIVE

Edits for Oxford (OXFORD!!!) are well under way... Not to jinx anything, but I may actually see the light of day on this. A short paragraph comparing Jack Benny to Jerry Seinfeld or some other newbie schnook, and I am in like Flynn.

Tonight, I go off in search of some TV for rent (Seinfeld, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Mad About You... anything with a prominent Jewish male in it, really) just to round out my "Legacy of Jack Benny" segment, and then a bit of extra research, followed by some touch-ups to the citations, and that's all she wrote. A day or two should do it.

Yes, I'm gonna make it after all!

Holly P., published scholar. Yes, I like that.
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Smoking Cigarettes and Watching Captain Kangaroo

Well, replace "watching Captain Kangaroo" with "drinking coffee and editing like a fiend all stinking night," and you'll have the gist of my evening. I have to get an edited draft of something out ASAP, and work has been not progressing as quickly as it should. Now is time to light the gas, Holly. No playing solitaire til dawn with a deck of 51... but it is starting to feel as fun and useful as that would be.

Oh, and Happy Birthday, John. Good luck on your next 30 years, too.
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Don't Jinx It...

Got something very nearly resembling an acceptance for a publication, with some minor edits and one expansion requested. I don't want to curse myself, but things are looking up.

Don't wish me luck. Please.
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Has Anyone Ever Told You You Look Like the Prince of Wales?

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, HARPO!

Arthur "Harpo" Marx
Film Comedian, Musician, Author, Socialite, Father

November 23, 1888 - September 28, 1964

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Goose Pimply All Over

Research Methods in Anthropology: Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches, by H. Russell Bernard (2005)... Doesn't that sound EXCITING boys and girls?

Jealous? I know you are.
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Give Me Your Tears, or I Will Take Them

I went to see Borat (2006) last night, and I don't know if it makes me a horrible person or not, but I laughed and laughed and laughed. Really, I would say "they don't make comedies like this any more," but I don't think they ever did. Bringing Up Baby (1938) this ain't, but wow-ee... What a way to forget your work troubles for a few hours. I highly recommend it to any one not prone to righteous indignation or any form of offence taken. I saw it in a theater filled with college-age men, and even there there were a number of uncomfortable gasps. That should say it all.

But I am left wondering: He can show people in giant, grotesque Jew costumes being chased and beaten to death by a village full of pogrom participants while they try to lay their infectious Jew eggs, but he avoided showing anyone smoking? In the former Soviet Union nation of Kazakhstan, no one smokes??? This seemed to be a stretch of realism not even I could handle.

And if smoking is more offensive than pogroms, rubber fists and poop in a baggy... We really have to sort out our priorities here, people.
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Take That!

Reading is actually going extraordinarily well today. Stuff is actually getting into my brain, sticking, and, on top of all that, firing my brain. Could it be that the brain-fog is finally lifting on the coast lines of my synapses? Finally?? It's about time, as comp exam reading for the past month was most likely to result in a nap, rather than any real work getting done. It was starting to freak me out, so I am pleased. I may actually survive this exam!


Today, I am finishing up some methodological groundwork via Pals' terrific Eight Theories of Religion (2006), as well as issues involving feminism, with Darlene Juschka's Feminism in the Study of Religion (2001), and, making full use of my suddenly ambidextrous brain, Jose Casanova's fairly comprehensible (what a welcome change from some of these books!) book, Public Religions in the Modern World (1994).

I see the light at the end of the tunnel! It may not last, but any glimmer of academic hope is a welcome change these days.
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HOW much is that kitten in the window??

I have now been without a cat for a month, and I have to say it is starting to drive me to distraction. Every cat in my neighbourhood is harassed whenever I see them: "Here, kitty... no, come back. Wanna play? Plleeease?" A cat taunted me the other day by walking right past my ground-level window, and would not even pause when I begged him. The situation is getting severe.

So I cruised on over to the local Humane Society website, only to find that cats run at about $200 to $300 a pop. Yes, I know this includes shots and the ole snip, and something extra to keep the very worthwhile thing afloat, but I can't really manage that amount right now, so I remain catless.

It is a sad state.

All I want for Christmas is a little kitty to call my own. Is that too much to ask for? I'd feed him and brush him and take real good care of him, and I would love him lots and lots.

Just, please, please, please, Fate, send me a "Free to Good Home" sign real soon, OK?

Or just send the above cat (named Sprite, at the K-W Shelter) my way, no questions asked.
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That's It - Back to the Abacus!

I may as well remove this comp, and chuck it into the deepest pit of the farthest reaches of the planet, and place the empty boxes it came in on my desk, and I would have greater satisfaction. At least boxes can be counted on to be what they are: boxes. They would box to their utmost design capabilities. They would be as boxie as I wanted them to be. Their boxiosity would be to their full extent, and their boxing speeds would be exactly as they were meant to be.

As it is, this hunk of steaming annoyance does nothing but make me want to stick a ciggarette in every single hole in my head and smoke until the frustrations go away and stop wanting me to use my left boot to forcibly violate every port and passage on the hedgehog-biting-SOB that passes itself off as a comp.

Labour saving device, my arse!

Whatever you believe purgatory to be, I am in it, and this comp is with me... So, whatever I have done wrong, I am working it off, I assure you.

Rat bastard comp. Burn and rot. May you never reach the Acer land of the honorable dead, and may your motherboard fall out with a thousand syphilitic lesions and ten thousand violent convulsions of electronic pain, you worthless (yet oddly expensive) pain in the sinus.

Oh, and one more thing: 1010101110101010100101110100011010101 - I hope that means something awful to you about your mother, you piece of plastic monstrosity.

I'm not too bitter, am I?
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Teeter

A hot bath + a cup of jasmine tea = bliss.

Strange emails + indecision + back ache + butt-loads of work = The Enemy.

Which one wins right now?
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Pee or Off the Pot

Have discovered Digital Distractions... so now, either I put up with a comp slower than the fall of a nun's panties for like 3 days, or I cut and run from an evening's worth of slow cranking annoyance already expended... If anyone has any suggestions to make this thing work better, please drop me a line.
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Time to Kick Comp Arse

Conditions Stabilizing

Back to listening to the CBC, back to school work, back to contact with local friends, back to AIM with Amanda...

So, yeah... hmmm... Life is returning to normal.
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Where is the Snow?

Warm-ish and rain is nice, but where is the snow?

With a pile of reading, some hot chocolate inside and a pile of the white-and-fluffy outside would really be the meaning of comfort these days. If you have to be bolted to the sofa, anyway, then you may as well have a climate-related reason.

Oh well... back to it.
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Death March (First Leg) Complete

Walter Capps' Religious Studies: The Making of a Discipline, which I started reading for my doctoral exam prep a month ago (at least), but abandoned due to its uncanny ability to put me to sleep within two pages every single time, is NOW FINISHED. Now I can type up what precious little notes the useless thing has afforded me, and put it far, far behind me... I may throw it into the river, I haven't decided. But, then, the fish don't need that crap, either. Maybe I will just keep it around for an insomnia cure.

Oh well, one down, 30-some left to go.
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Back to Work

A book a day for a month and a half (with RA work stitched in when necessary and possible), and I may just barely survive this term, and pull it out of the fire.

9 to 5, with an hour (exactly) for lunch, six days a week, right up until January 5th. Time off must only be with good cause. Coffee breaks and email checks, etc., are all regulated. Each day must have a block of progress to show for the time, or there will be hell to pay.

And believe me, my boss (me) is a real b*tch.
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Internet... I hate You

Firefox ate my blog. %^&%%$@#!*%$#!!!!!!

It is back in some form, but it was an experiment in nerves and a lot of cursing.

I am not even sure that blogging is worthwhile any more, but I will sleep on it before I flip the "delete" switch, just in case it is my temper telling me to pull the plug on this poor thing.

However, despite blood pressure enough to pop my ear drums, I am well, settling in fine, and am now hooked up to the net and open for business... though after tonight's experience, I am not 100% internet is a blessing in any form, and may stick to radio from now on.

Calm Blue Ocean. Calm Blue Ocean. Calm Blue Ocean...
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Checking In

In the new apartment, but have no internet at home. I am currently in the oddest internet-cafe-slash-shoe-store ever found by human eyes. And that is a very odd sentence.

The new place is great, loan money arrived, and I am well... and work is re-starting on doctoral exam prep, too, so I will survive, after all.

(Thanks to my movers for their help, wheels and cheers.)

Hang in with me, more updates will follow when I can arrange it.

:)

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